MARKETING 189 



Boston. Very often butter ranking as medium "firsts " 

 in New York will sell as quickly as " extras " in Boston. 

 However, the grading is much nearer to uniformity now 

 than before the days of the creamery. At present butter 

 is not made in so many small lots on farms as previously, 

 but is manufactured in larger quantities in creameries. 

 Thus it is not subject to so many variations in flavor, 

 body, color, salt, and finish. Also the grading is more 

 uniform because of the present method of employing 

 experts in scoring butter as market inspectors. The 

 teaching in grading at the various colleges of agriculture, 

 state fairs,* exhibitions of dairy-men's associations, and 

 the monthly educational scoring of dairy products in 

 various states, undoubtedly have an effect toward more 

 uniformity in grading. 



In the days when there were no creameries, simple 

 terms such as " fair," " good," and " prime " were em- 

 ployed to describe the quality of butter. Later the words 

 " choice," " fine," and then " fancy " were used for the 

 best grades. A general grading was afterwards estab- 

 lished with the terms " firsts," " seconds" and "thirds." 

 When the creamery butter from the West came to the 

 market it was recognized as being better than the dairy 

 product and was placed above the grades at that time, 

 being known as " western extras." It should be remem- 

 bered that the first creamery in the United States was 

 built in New York state (see Chapter I) . However, there 

 was a large demand in the East for cheese and milk, 

 whereas the best outlet for the dairy in the middle-western 

 states was by means of butter. About 1905 the word 

 " western " was supplanted by " creamery," the term be- 

 coming " creamery extras." The reason for this change 

 was that many creameries had been organized in the East, 



